Who is covered by the compensation scheme?

Everyone who receives healthcare treatment or purchases medicine in Denmark is covered by the Danish Patient Compensation - regardless of where the injury happens.

It does not matter whether your injury happens at a hospital, at your own physician (GP), in connection with home care or in another situation.

It does not matter if the institution is private or publicly owned.

Health professional treatment

You must have received healthcare treatment from an authorized healthcare professional to claim compensation. In Danish law an authorized healthcare professional is for example a doctor or a physiotherapist.

The law includes injuries that happen:

  • At public and private hospitals
  • General practicing doctors and doctors from the emergency service
  • General practicing medical specialists
  • General practicing chiropractors, occupational therapists, physiotherapists and podiatrists
  • General practicing nurses, midwives, clinical dietitians, medical laboratory technicians, surgical appliance makers, radiographers, opticians/contact lens opticians and social and health care workers
  • Authorized healthcare workers within the public health care services and the regional dental care etc.
  • Treatment in the ambulance or at the site of the injury
  • Injuries to donors or participants in medical trials
  • Preventative health-care systems for children and teenagers, the home nursing care system, dental care, dental care for children and teenagers, offers of rehabilitation and treatment for alcohol and drug abuse
  • Treatment carried out by health personnel deployed in a prison or at a military base
  • Injuries which occured in the Faroe Islands as of 2012

  • Treatment carried out abroad at the patients own initiative (without referral)
  • Treatment carried out in Greenland
  • Treatment carried out at the Faroe Islands prior to 2012
  • Side-effects caused by herbal medicine or dietary supplements
  • Side-effects caused by medicine bought or handed out abroad
  • Injuries at a dentist, in regional dental care, at a school's dental clinic, in the university department of odontology or at the emergency dental care. The compensation claim should be filed with the Dental Association's Dental Injury Compensation Scheme

Nevertheless, there is always the option of claiming compensation according to the general law of tort (culpa).